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County under high drought alert

Most of Washington County is considered to be in an “Exceptional Drought,” prompting concerns about water, crops and wildfires, according to Washington County Emergency Management Director Kary Cox.

A map produced by the Oklahoma Climatological Survey U.S. Drought Monitor on Dec. 4 shows that small slices of the county, in the northern and southern extremes, are considered to be in “Extreme Drought,” while the center of the county falls into the “Exceptional Drought” category — the highest intensity of drought in the state.

To the east, the majority of Nowata County remains in “Extreme Drought.” To the west, a vast swath of central Osage County is also experiencing “Exceptional Drought” conditions.

Cox said it is difficult to draw a line in Washington County and that the “Exceptional Drought” covers most of the county. He said for planning purposes, Washington County Emergency Management considers the entire county to be in an “Exceptional Drought.”

“We had seen a slight improvement in the drought conditions late in the summer or early fall,” Cox said. “And so we were hoping that it was going to improve a little bit.

“But, just in the recent weeks, a month or so, it has gotten worse actually than what it was this summer.”

He said water is a main concern.

“All the area lakes (and) ponds are way below normal. And, right now, we’re going into what is traditionally the driest quarter for our area. This December, January, February time-frame is traditionally the time of year that we get the least amount of precipitation, at least for this area,” Cox said. “That’s a little concerning that this drought is worsening as we’re going into that traditionally driest part of the year anyway.”

As of Friday, Hulah Lake in northeast Osage County — from which the City of Bartlesville draws its water supply — was 48.98 percent full, with a pool elevation of 728.39.

Lake levels have been discussed recently by the Bartlesville City Council and an ordinance was approved last week that put into place mandatory water restrictions for citizens.

The ordinance includes sections on penalties for violations of it and the possibility for raising rates, neither of which are being implemented at this time.

City Manager Ed Gordon said the water restrictions currently consist of residential addresses being restricted to once-a-week outdoor irrigation with even-numbered addresses being restricted to Tuesday and odd-numbered addresses being restricted to Thursday.

Coming off of two years of extreme wildfires, he said there are concerns about what the spring will bring as far as wildfires.

Cox said burn bans could become a real possibility around spring.

“To my knowledge, at least locally, there’s not been any discussion about burn bans because we haven’t had any real problems with fires,” he said. “We haven’t discussed that yet because it hasn’t been abnormal. I know that they’ve been having talks at the state level about the drought and anytime they discuss the drought, of course, statewide burn bans are something that come into that discussion as well.

“But I haven’t seen any indications that they’re on the edge of actually issuing those burn bans yet.”

He said he would not be surprised in the coming weeks if there were some gubernatorial burn bans issued.

Other concerns involve crops, farm animals and wildlife.

“A lot of these stock ponds are either dry or drying up very quickly. For the farmers and ranchers to be able to get water for their livestock, that’s going to be a concern, if it’s not already, for a lot of them,” Cox said.

Cox urges area citizens to be extremely cautious with outdoor burning activities and to be aware of the water situation and take steps to conserve it.

“It’s going to take more than just one thunderstorm to bring us out of this drought,” he said. “When you’re in those dry to moderate and even the lower end of the severe drought situations, one good thunderstorm can really go a long ways to help that out but once you get into those extreme or exceptional drought areas, you need long-term moisture to fix the problem.”